Former Lionhead Studios boss John Needham is now in charge of internal development for several games and experiences on Microsoft’s Xbox and HoloLens platforms, a Microsoft spokesperson told Engadget today. Needham reports directly to Kudo Tsunoda, head of Microsoft Studios’ portfolio investments team and former creative director for Kinect Games. Needham took over as the head of Microsoft’s Lionhead Studios in 2013 and he’s been involved in the corporate gaming world since joining Sony Online Entertainment in 2001. As the leader of Lionhead, the studio behind Fable, Needham reported directly to former Microsoft VP Phil Harrison. Needham relocated to Microsoft’s offices in Redmond, Washington, for his new role.

When Microsoft sees a hot technology, it wastes no time making strides on it. Years ago, it catapulted motion gaming with the introduction of its Kinect device; and now, the HoloLens, which was introduced earlier this year, is getting its full attention.

The proliferation of smartphones and tablets, along with new free-to-play games luring a new audience of gamers, has helped the United States video game industry to see consistent growth despite a global recession. According to the Entertainment Software Association, the video game industry grew four times faster than the American economy between 2009 and 2012.

Video game jobs have flourished across the country, growing at 9% each year since 2009, thanks in part to tax incentives in a growing number of states and more video game programming at colleges and universities. The game industry directly employs more than 42,0000 people in 36 states, a more than 30% increase since the 2009 report.

It’s not a bad gig, either. Industry employees earning an average annual compensation of up to $95,000, and total direct compensation for all workers directly employed in the video game software industry was more than $4 billion. In…

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Recently, 343 Studios released a cryptic video pertaining to the master chief and a reporter, Benjamin Giraud who is urged to do a full report on him by ONI. At first many saw the picture with the words “traitor,” written on a bullet and a countdown timer. As the countdown reached zero, a website leading to the Halo 5 HUNT the TRUTH tumblr site. Upon, hearing of another countdown for today, 3/29, I decided to review the previous video and the voice recording to refresh my memory. What I found next was very interesting.

When loading up the trailer with the bullet being shot into the mask and skull of what looks to be the Master Chief. This left a lot of unanswered questions and enticed the world with such an odd teaser. Upon further detail, I noticed as the video was loading a finger slowly slide from the play button to the right side of the screen. As if to say i should slide my finger rather than just watch it…

As I began to slide my finger, my finger speed became the speed at which the video played and many more words began to appear. Those words are:

How many of you saw the finger slider and saw these hidden words written on the bullet? If you haven’t seen it for yourself, check it out here. This has only added to my anticipation and can’t wait for the reveal later today. I will see what I can find out. Feel free to like, subscribe, and share. And if anyone else knows anything please comment below, or add your thoughts. Thanks guys!

Xbox Wire announced today the games which would be featured in their Games with Gold promotion. Earlier this month they advised us on a surprise and told everyone to be on the look out for more games. Which games would be chosen and how many was left to ponder. Larry Hryb, Xbox’s Major Nelson, took to his twitter handle @MajorNelson, to announce the double feature April Surprise:

There you will see the Season Pass and Add-on DLC’s listed for free for anyone to grab. The Xbox 360 version however must be D/L individually. I have verified this and again thank Chris for the heads up. The original story can be found below.

Overdog! the first interest-based matchmaking service has come to the Xbox One for those in the preview program. Overdog was recently featured at GDC 2015. For further details check out their site below.

Their most recent tweets suggests they’ve been busy since then!

Overdog is officially launching on Xbox One in March! We're excited to share more details with you all very soon. pic.twitter.com/1x7LpJ5iwK

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It took some time but I can finally say and confirm that the PS+ games for March 2015 have been announced! And let me be the first to say, its a mighty fine package! Fans have a lot of different choices and personally I got really lucky! I don’t own any of these games currently and can’t wait to get my hands on them. So what do you guys think? What did you want? Let us know in the comments!

PlayStation 4: Sony’s High-End Console

PS4 1) Oddworld: Abe’s Oddysee – New ‘n’ Tasty! – An updated version of a classic platformer. Abe’s back with awesome graphics, sound and controls.

PS4 2) Valiant Hearts: The Great War – Tells the story of different people and the struggles of surviving through WWI.

PlayStation 3: Sony’s Entry Level Console

PS3 1) Papo & Yo – A unique puzzling adventure starring a boy, Quico, and a monster named, Monster. They are best friends and have to help each other through an amazing world.

PS3 2) Sherlock Holmes: Crimes and Punishments – Follow the legend Sherlock Holmes and solve some cases in the style that only Holmes can.

PlayStation Vita: Sony’s Hand-Held

PSV 1) OlliOlli2: Welcome to Olliwood – Did you love OlliOlli? Tony Hawk? This game takes you back into the side scrolling skateboard world that lets you grind, jump, and do tricks! How far can you make it?

PSV 2) CounterSpy – A unique vision, inspired by the Cold War, tasks players with keeping the world in balance.

Each and every month the people at Microsoft and Sony have to wrestle around and figure out which games to offer their community for free and which unique deals they will have. This helps our collections and is seen as an appreciation for using their services. This started off with Sony and was quickly imitated around the industry. If you can recall, Sony, gave members of its PS+ service free games because of the infamous Sony hack that took the service down for months and leaked many users information. At that time, PS+ was a service for members but was not a requirement to play online. Being the gamer that I am and was I had to have it! What started off as a definite money gouger turned into a data leak. In the leak was personal information for many of Sony’s loyal customers. The hack was then released to the public.

To save face and make things right, Sony, gave its members free games. They must have had great feedback and huge gains in membership, because immediately PS+ subscriptions began offering different games each month as part of a new and revamped PS+ service. With its success, it was only a matter of time before Xbox began to do the same. The difference being, Xbox 360 owners were able to keep the games even when their Gold accounts expired. What started off as an apology and a gift to show appreciation, revolutionized subscription based network services. For the first time, subscription values made sense and people were more than willing to shell out the cost of a game to receive a handful back throughout the year. What seems to be happening now is a direct result of competition. Sony and Microsoft trying to one-up each other is the greatest thing to hear as far a a gamer is concerned. I would bet these deals and offerings each month, are probably tied to the same contracts and exclusivity deals as when the titles originally release. Which brings me back to our topic. Did you know that you can add games to your Xbox One library with an active Gold account? No! Let me explain.

With the new competition for living room superiority, Sony and Microsoft, both began offering better games. Games ranged from older known indies, at the beginning, to older AAA’s and newer indies by the end of last generation. The new generation started and PS+ service was now a requirement for Sony users. This raised the bar again, leading the consoles to offer brand new indies and fairly newer AAA titles. Its funny how many people take this service for granted and think they are owed games each month. Some people go as far as threatening to cancel their sub if the quality of games offered isn’t up to their standards. That’s just stupid, they don’t need to give us anything. If you don’t like whats on offer, don’t add the game to your library. Each month, these games are used to set them apart from the competition. In order to secure those games each month, meetings are held, feedback is read, and data is crunched, and put to use. From the meetings a deal is made and the games are offered to us for free. Major Nelson, aka Larry Hyrb, recently made a little known secret available to the community. All Xbox 360 owners with a current Gold memberships can now add Xbox One games to their library, even if they don’t own the console yet. This was feature was added onto the Xbox 360 dashboard in the Games with Gold for Xbox One section. Before, this was normally reserved for those with access to a PC. Basically. if they don’t have an Xbox One they can build their library of games each month. A link to the blog can be seen here: Xbox 360 Owners: Start building your Xbox One Game Library for free – Xbox Live’s Major Nelson.

Couldn’t we already do this? Let me explain. Ever since I bought the Day 1 console (I still own 360), I would go online on the 1st and 15th to download the games offered via the Xbox store on my PC, allowing me to stay seated and not have to change the inputs or outputs on the TV. I’ve been doing this since I got the console! Not just for me but for my extended family members, as well. The fact that they extended this feature onto the Xbox 360, says a lot about Microsoft. I own all the PlayStation consoles, too, but haven’t verified if it the PSN store can do the same things. I know you can buy PS games on the PSN web site but I’m assuming you can’t buy a PS4 game on the PS3 unless its cross-buy game. It seems that Microsoft is bringing things together in preparation of DX12 and Windows 10 operating system.

The ability to add Xbox One games to my Gold account and family accounts has always been available through our PC browser and has been added as a new update to your 360. This adds a lot of benefits and value to the Xbox brand. People will have access these games as soon as they log into their new Xbox One’s with the same GT they use on the 360. Do you find this just as promising for those who havent upgraded yet? If you knew this before you bought a PS4/or any other console, would it have swayed which one you bought? This will help many of us to build some of the largest libraries we’ve ever had, and it will only continue to get better. In fact, I see this as a great value and an excellent way to increase subscriptions and retention of Xbox Live accounts.

Its Official! Major Nelson is now recommending everyone do the same, but rather than having to go to your browser or PC, do it directly from the Xbox 360. In no time your game collection could overcome your current generation collection. Unlike the 360, a Gold account is required to play the games on the Xbox One, but are still yours to keep. This is a great addition for all those Xbox 360 owners who may have missed some of the games from the 1st year, and weren’t knowledgeable about how to do this in the first place, can jump into it now, and from your Xbox 360 with ease. On the 360, the Gold games were given to us and did not require an active account because the license was transferred to the console.

Secretly, I thought I was able to do this because I had both consoles and they were my family members. Come to find out everyone can! Fortunately, I’ve been doing this for my entire family since Day 1. Did any one you guys do this as well? The idea of building their accounts, adding the Gold game offerings each month, makes their future purchase decisions that much easier because of the huge library that they had built, without even owning the Xbox One. I tip my hat for adding the feature onto the Xbox 360, it shows me and the rest of the world how to keep users happy, while achieving growth without greed. Think about that. How many of you knew you could do this? Would you have thought this feature would be kept under wraps,? How do you feel about this announcement? Does this increase your incentive to buy knowing up until you buy you can still add the games to your library? Let us know in the comments below.

I will say this! If I didn’t own an Xbox One, and knew I could do this while saving for it, I would own an Xbox One. Since I have one and have been doing this for awhile, I say, “Welcome aboard!” Jumping to the current generation has never had a better incentive, been easier and with the value proposition is unmatched. Can’t wait to see what the rest of the current generation and future generations have to come.

My Personal Experience: I have gotten my brother every Games with Gold game ever offered on the Xbox One program, but he hasn’t made the jump yet. Of course he will be in for a big surprise when he finally does though. I had no idea people hadn’t shared this a year ago. I thought many of you were already aware of this, and apologize for not saying so sooner. I want to thank Major Nelson for sharing this Day 1 feature with the Xbox community, and expanding it further by including the Xbox 360. This allows people an opportunity to enjoy more games, and have more time playing. The more we know of the Xbox and its capabilities, the more we can enjoy the services it provides to the fullest extent. Which brought up another interesting topic I hope to share with you all soon. Can we share our games, with friends and family, from across the world? What if I told you, Yes?

This has been on my mind since the Xbox One was announced. Family sharing, although they changed from their original ideas, allowed family or up to 10 friends to share and exchange games from each other, as long as you were on each others list of friends and family. They also had to be on your friends list for a minimum of 30 days, if I remember correctly. So what happened to this idea? Will they e implementing this or bringing it back?